


Time of Death

by doctoralanabloom



Category: Now You See Me (Movies)
Genre: F/M, aaaaand for context emily is danny's sister who also passed away because of cancer, also daniel's dad is a prisoner in rikers, death tw, it was for an angst prompt so, major major cancer tw, theres that, which is decidedly prison, yeah this story is inspired by some danny/henley hcs that chris and i have
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-06
Updated: 2016-10-06
Packaged: 2018-08-19 20:25:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8223713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doctoralanabloom/pseuds/doctoralanabloom
Summary: Henley gets a phone call she never thought she'd have to answer and says a goodbye she never thought she'd have to say.





	

**Author's Note:**

> (It'll make it more sad, but I recommend you listen to the first three tracks of Hospice by the Antlers. Prologue, Kettering, and Sylvia. They set the mood for me when I wrote this!)

"Hello, may I speak to Ms. Henley Reeves?"

 

"This is she," Henley replies nervously. The caller id says Northshore Hospital. That can't be a good sign.

 

"We have you listed as the emergency contact for a James Daniel Fleischmann?" 

 

"Yes, I–" Henley cuts herself off. _Oh god,_ she thinks, _no no no no no._

 

"I'm sorry to tell you that he passed away this morning. We were asked specifically not to contact you until... Well." A pause before the woman on the other end of the line goes on. "His only remaining family is his father, but he's–"

 

"Rikers," she interjects, blankly, "I know."

 

“Daniel has asked you to be in charge of the funeral preparations; it’s in his will. There’s a bit of money. And he left you his apartment.” Silence.

 

“It was the…”

 

“He had cancer,” the voice says gently, “yes.” 

 

This is what makes Henley finally break.

 

Tears well up in her eyes and begin to pour forth and her voice is high and shaky. “Th-Thank you, I–” A sob wracks through her, finally, ripping across the phone line so that the doctor on the other side has to hold it away from her ear, lips pulled tight in sympathy. When she brings the phone back to her ear, the line is dead.

 

Henley is on the ground, now, sandwiched into a corner, knees pressed up against her chest. She can barely get enough air to heave each new sob and her body shakes with shock or bereavement or fear; she does not know which.

 

Her hands cover her mouth and nose in an attempt to stifle the sound, but it keeps coming, spilling over and out like floodgates have been opened. She should have known; she hadn’t heard from him in weeks aside from scattered phone calls, and even those had felt strange, like he wasn’t being honest with her. Through it all, Henley still knew him all too well. Maybe not well _enough_ , but… Cancer was in his family. She _knew_ that, she understood that there was always the possibility. Or, she thought she did. She had, maybe, when they first started dating, when he told her about everything, about Emily. So really, the shock is quite undue. And yet, here she is, feeling infinitesimally small and so cosmically wronged. A half hour passes. Then an hour. She doesn’t want to move, but she figures they’ll need her at the hospital.

 

Driving there is probably not the smartest idea, but she doesn’t want to see anyone she doesn’t have to. Walking into the hospital lobby is, in and of itself, enough to make her feel sick. Her eyes are bright and wide, and she looks around in a daze. People on literally all sides cast her sympathetic looks, or politely avert their eyes and it makes her want to scream because how dare they pretend to know her grief? And yet, how dare they look away as if it embarrasses them?

 

“Hello, miss.” She’s at the desk.

 

“Hi, um… I’m here for– to see Daniel Atlas–” Fuck. “Fleischmann. Daniel Fleischmann.” She bites her lip to keep silent while he looks Danny up.

 

“I’m sorry, the name isn’t coming up in the records–”

 

“James. James… Daniel. James Daniel Fleischmann. That’s his...” Her voice shakes. “Um, that’s his full name.” The security guard nods and softly tells her the number of his room and she makes her way numbly into the elevator. A man with a disturbingly bright bouquet of flowers stands to her right and gets off on the floor before her. 

 

She can hear her footsteps echoing off the sterile tile of the hospital floor, but it doesn’t feel like she’s actually moving. Doors float past her. 422, 423, 424, 425… 426. The door is closed. Locked, when she tries the handle. A woman’s head flicks up in the corner of Henley’s eye and scurries over. “Miss Reeves? I’m Doctor Goldman, Daniel’s oncologist.” Henley simply nods.

 

“Can I just have a minute with him? I’ll sign whatever you need me to, I’ll bring shit to Rikers, I don’t… But I just need a minute alone with him.” The woman nods.

 

“Of course.” Henley moves almost imperceptibly back so the doctor can open the door, and strides slowly in.

 

He’s there. Of course he’s there, what else should she have expected? But it still hurts to see him cold, alone, _gone._ She takes a deep and wavering breath and the door shuts quietly behind her. The distance feels immeasurable, but in reality it only takes a few steps to make it to his bedside. Henley pulls a chair up behind her, but stays standing, determined to keep as composed as possible for as long as possible. She reaches for Danny’s hand, but stops.

 

The pop of the buttons on her gloves sounds impossibly loud and the air feels cold on her hands when she takes them off. Her breath rattles now when she inhales, and she finally slips her hand into his. It shatters her heart to feel nothing; no warmth, no pulse, no life. He can’t squeeze back and tell her everything will be okay, that she’ll be okay. He can’t tell her it was fast or didn’t hurt. Her knees shake and then buckle and she sits heavily down on the chair, chest tight and pressed against the plastic rail of the bed. She clutches his hand with both of hers as tears spill onto warm and cool skin. No words come from her lips, teeth are clenched tight, but in her head she is screaming _I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU I’M SORRY._  

 

People passing by would only see a shock of red hair amongst a backdrop of harsh white. But inside that room was a girl and the boy she had loved so deeply, so fiercely, that he took a part of her with him when he left.


End file.
